Win98 slow to boot up

A couple of days ago I wrote in to a support group asking what to do about my Win98 PC showing “Windows 98 is starting your MS-DOS-based program” and I was referred to Microsoft’s bulletin Q187524. I followed all the recommendations, but NOW the PC says “Windows 98 is restarting…” each time I turn on the PC! And it’s still taking about 3 times as long to boot up to the desktop. I scanned with Mccaffe 4050/4066 and it didn’t detect anything.

Any Ideas?